Mai Tsujimoto’s Stay Experience with Her Family

In conversation with Mai Tsujimoto

Setsu Niseko recently had the opportunity to meet Mai Tsujimoto, a Japanese model. During her stay at Setsu, we had the opportunity to hear about her experience staying in Niseko with her young family. She is a very cheerful and friendly person, and was willing to share many stories of her stay with us. 

How is your stay in Niseko?

This is my first time in Niseko. It is colder than I expected. It's already spring in Tokyo, but you still need a down jacket here. I heard that Hokkaido is a great place to enjoy the snow at this time of year, and since I had never skied before, I decided to give it a try. So we decided to come here.

The kids participated in ski school, how was it?

It was great to have lessons. We could have taught the kids, but since it was our first time skiing, we thought it would be best to have professional instructors. Having an instructor with the kids meant we received professional lessons with very clear instructions and development. As a result, we were able to ski right away, and the kids had a lot of fun.

How do you and your family like to stay at Setsu?

Travelling with children is a lot of fun, but it can be tiring at times. Having the Setsu Ski Shuttle made it very convenient to get the whole family from the hotel to the ski slopes each day. Setsu has a kids playroom, so they were never bored, which is very helpful. 

How was breakfast?

It was very tasty. The rice is also delicious. Usually if you visit a hotel and they offer a buffet, the quality isn’t very good. However, we were very impressed with the buffet here. We stayed here for 5 nights and the breakfast dishes were a little different every day, so you can enjoy it without getting bored. There is enough variety and there is also something for the kids to eat, which is great. In particular, I really liked the ochazuke. I can feel the attention to detail in the condiments. 

The coffee was also a highlight. Even though it was a buffet, the barista made the coffee one cup at a time with your choice of milk. It is a blessing to be able to have a great cup of coffee in the morning. I’ve been looking forward to it so much each morning that I’ve been hurrying down to méli mélo -Yuki No Koe- to get a cup after a lovely sleep in.

How was the onsen?

I personally love the quality of the Setsu Niseko onsen. We also used the private onsen rooms, which are available by reservation only, and found them to be spacious and large enough for a family.

What are your plans for the rest of your stay?

We will ski every day. There are four resorts on one mountain in Niseko, so we can go to different places every day and we never get bored.

What did you eat while in Niseko?

Even though it is possible to get AFURI in Tokyo, we enjoyed the AFURI ramen at Setsu because of their exclusive menu that I don’t think we can get in Tokyo. The ramen was fresh and unique to Niseko, because they use water from Mount Yotei for the broth. On the second day, I was tired from all our skiing, so I bought a quick meal at a nearby Seicomart convenience store and ate it in our suite. Seicomart is a convenience store local to Hokkaido, so it was interesting to see some items that we don't see very often. My husband loves Seicomart's katsudon.

Would you like to come back to Niseko?

Since both of my children are boys, activities are essential for travel, so a winter ski trip is the perfect option for our family. The front desk told us that there are lots of fun activities in the summer as well, such as rafting, mountain biking, and hiking. We think it is very appealing to have activities to enjoy nature all year round. Now that our youngest child is four years old, he is old enough to enjoy activities with adults, so we would definitely like to come back in the green season and experience all the fun summer activities that Niseko has to offer.